Becoming a People Manager

In this short video, Tim answers a listener's question about how to become a people manager for the first time.

Transcript

Question: If you have not had any prior management experience, always been an individual contributor, how do you get yourself promoted to be a people manager?

Answer: The first and most important thing is to make sure that, as an individual contributor, you're really good at your job. And particularly if you're one of many people doing that same job, you have to possess a particular level of expertise to have credibility to go and actually manage others who are doing that job.

If you do have others around you, eventually, somebody will emerge as the team lead, the person who is directing others to do work. Even though you may not have the manager title, you may not get that promotion, there tends to be somebody who is the best person on the team who the others want to follow. Try to be that person.

A lot of it comes down to, after you have that expertise, having that empathy and ability to connect with other people. If it's just you and your boss, then you may have to look outside of work for other opportunities. If you're involved in organizations, try to take leadership positions in those, whether it's social clubs or charities or whatever it may be. Try to find opportunities to work out and flex that muscle a little bit, and you'll find that a lot of the skills that you'll develop in doing that will translate pretty well into your job.